1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a front fork for a saddle-type vehicle, and to a vehicle incorporating the same. More particularly, the present invention relates to a front fork for a saddle-type vehicle, having a pair of left and right leg members disposed on respective left and right sides of a front wheel, each leg member including an outer tube having a lower end portion thereof journaling an axle of the front wheel, an inner tube slidably fitted into the outer tube and having an upper portion thereof connected to a head pipe arranged at a front end portion of a vehicle body frame, and a spring installed in a compressed state between the outer tube and the inner tube, and to a vehicle incorporating the same.
2. Description of the Background Art
A number of designs are known for motorcycle front forks. An example of a front fork design is disclosed in Japanese Patent Laid-open No. Hei 7-196063.
According to Japanese Patent Laid-open No. Hei 7-196063, for correcting imbalance in weight between left and right sides of the vehicle, because of a disc brake disposed on either the left or right side of the a front wheel, an inner tube of a leg member, of a pair of left and right leg members of a front fork, on the side opposite to that on which the disc brake is disposed, is formed to have a wall thickness greater than a wall thickness of an inner tube of a leg member on the side on which the disc brake is disposed.
As disclosed in Japanese Patent Laid-open No. Hei 7-196063, however, having different wall thicknesses between the left and right inner tubes results in rigidity of the left and right leg members being different from each other. A solution for achieving a good balance between the left and right sides of the saddle-type vehicle has therefore very often been that an exhaust muffler, a battery, and other heavy components are placed appropriately, with the wall thickness of the left and right inner tubes kept identical. This has posed a problem of restricted layout of the vehicle body.
The present invention has been made in view of the foregoing situation. Accordingly, it is one of the objects of the present invention to provide a front fork for use in a saddle-type vehicle that can correct imbalance in weight between left and right sides occurring from an accessory disposed on at least one crosswise side of a front wheel, or in weight between left and right sides of a vehicle body occurring from a heavy element disposed on the vehicle body, while enhancing the degree of freedom in layout of the vehicle body. The term “saddle ride” may be substituted for the term “saddle-type” throughout this document, and these terms are used interchangeably.